Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the key factors affecting Mainland Chinese students pursuing a Master of Education degree in Hong Kong on their study abroad decision and return intentions. Design/methodology/approach: The current study employed a mixed-methods approach to investigate factors that affect Mainland Chinese students pursuing MEd degrees in Hong Kong. Participants were first invited to fill out a questionnaire. After collecting and analyzing the survey data, in-depth interviews with a selected group of students were carried out by the research team to obtain useful qualitative data to triangulate the survey findings. A purposeful and convenience sampling method, carried out through the personal network of the research team, was used to recruit MEd Mainland Chinese students in Hong Kong to participate in the current study. Findings: The findings provided compelling evidence that Hong Kong was an attractive study destination to this particular group of MEd Chinese students. The findings also indicated that academic factors were more important than social, cultural and economic factors when it came to choosing their study destination. In contrast to previous studies, participants expressed a much stronger desire to return home upon graduation. The three most influential predictors of their decision to return were the lack of a Hong Kong teaching certificate (r=+0.36), the opportunity to contribute to their hometown (r=+0.31) and the inclination to be closer to family and friends (r=+0.20). Originality/value: While a number of studies have been carried out to study why Mainland Chinese students chose Hong Kong as their study destination to pursue their teacher training degree, none of these studies focused exclusively on fee-paying MEd Chinese students. Hong Kong is facing keen competition from both traditional host countries and emerging host countries to recruit students from Mainland China. It is therefore crucial to understand the needs of

香港少數族裔人口近年不斷上升，入讀本地學校的人數亦相應遞升。就回應本港學前機構對支援少數族裔幼兒學習的需求，本講座會討論學前機構遇到的問題，並就此提出改善策略，希望能透過教師培訓、政府支援和民間團體組織協助，為少數族裔學童提供多元學習機會，推廣共融學習文化。The population of ethnic minorities in Hong Kong has been increasing in recent years, and correspondingly the number of ethnic minority students enrolled in local schools has been rising. To address the needs of preschools in Hong Kong to support the learning of ethnic minority children, this seminar examines the problems that preschools are facing on this issue and proposes strategies for improvement. Hopefully, through strategic management, teacher training, government support and collaboration with civil organizations, more learning opportunities can be provided to ethnic minority children and an integrated learning culture can be promoted. Copyright © 2018 Learning & Teaching Expo.

Present literature concerning ethnic students in Hong Kong has been largely focusing on ethnic students' struggle in identity formation, emotional and behavioral needs, acquisition of Chinese language, disparity of social rights and opportunities as well as academic and career mobility, etc. While perspectives of ethnic students' learning under mainstream teaching in Chinese schools have attracted much attention, voices of frontline educators' learning from everyday teaching ethnic students are not widely addressed. Rather perceiving teacher as a traditional authority figure in a mono-cultural Chinese classroom, this particular case-study argues growing number of frontline Chinese teachers have been undergoing experiential learning and ongoing reflection through daily teaching and interaction with ethnic Muslim students in Hong Kong. Copyright © 2018 Hong Kong Sociological Association 20th Annual Conference.

Students from Mainland China are the largest group of non-local students for Hong Kong universities in recent years. To attract more Mainland students and smoothen their application processes, the admission policies of Hong Kong universities are becoming increasingly more compatible for students from Mainland by recognizing various qualifications and standard examinations (e.g., Joint Entrance Exam For Universities in PRC, College English Test and Test for English Majors). However, the quick increasing amount of Mainland students in Hong Kong universities has brought various social issues concerning arguments about the medium of instructions, Hong Kong-mainland contradictions and so on. To understand how the various policy text, this essay reviews the admission policies of Hong Kong universities and related issues from three aspects: institution categories, programme levels, and place of origin. Furthermore, research questions such as what broader politics surround the policy issue, which institutions/actors are involved in the policy process and what the outcomes are answered by employing the political system theories. The social problems related to the admission policies will be examined and discussed, solutions for which will also be proposed. Copyright © 2019 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

Informed by research literature about intercultural competence development, this paper aims to explore non-local students’ skills and strategies in communication when they study at a university in Hong Kong. The previous research indicated that they usually experience many problems to adapt into host culture and country because they are lacking in language proficiency and social-cultural knowledge. Students’ prior learning experience, attitude, psychological or behavioural factors can affect their communication skills. In addition, different languages, dialects, accents, characters or cultural difference between their home and host cultures can also cause communication barriers to the students. This study shows that most of the non-local students, mainly the Chinese, still encounter language difficulties in communication in a Chinese society. Such difficulties are reported in studies on Gangpiaos (literally meaning Mainland Chinese drifters in Hong Kong) as well; the word “drifter” implies adaptation difficulties for Mainland Chinese immigrates. Nonetheless, existing empirical studies have been seldom tapped into non-local university students’ intercultural communication capability and how they cope with their communication difficulties in a Chinese society. The present study seeks to fill this research gap in the literature. Based on in-depth interviews with 30 non-local students who were studying in undergraduate, graduate and doctoral programmes, this paper adopted thematic analysis to examine the students’ language obstacles and identify the pattern of their communication practices in the process of intercultural adaptation in Hong Kong. Coping strategies in communication and implications for policies, which assist in young Gangpiaos in developing their intercultural communication knowledge and skills, are drawn based on the findings. Copyright © 2018 HKERA International Conference.

This paper explores the influence of friendship in mainland Chinese (MC) students’ adaptation to studying in Hong Kong. The number of MC students in Hong Kong has amounted to 18,887 in 2016, which makes it necessary for universities to cater for these students’ adaptation. Research has identified social-cultural differences between MC students and their local peers despite shared traditional Chinese cultural root. Existing studies have shown that international students can adapt to the new culture better and be more confident by making cross-cultural friends. Previous research has mainly focused on MC students’ difficulties in their adaptation, but how friendship influences their adaptation is still under-researched. This paper addresses the research questions: (1) What strategies do mainland students adopt to establish friendships during their study in Hong Kong? (2) What are the facilitating and hindering factors for mainland students to establish friendship? (3) How can friendship help mainland students adapt to their study and life in Hong Kong? A total of 24 MC university students studying in Hong Kong were interviewed. Thematic analysis was employed for data analysis. The findings show that friendship plays an important role in MC students’ adaptation to studying in Hong Kong, especially regarding daily life routines, such as how to deal with visa issues and navigate the university’s course selection system. MC students build friendships mainly through taking part in social and academic learning activities. Nonetheless, political-social conflicts between Hong Kong and Mainland China have, to a certain extent, hindered friendship establishment between MC and local students. Copyright © 2018 HKERA International Conference.

This qualitative study investigates the interplay between the ethnic and academic identity construction of a group of university students with South Asian backgrounds in Hong Kong. The findings indicate that ethnic identity and ethnic socialization have protective and facilitative effects on learning motivation and academic achievement. It is found that these ethnic minority students receiving tertiary education, holding congruent views of ethnic and academic identity, display a sense of agency and critical reflectivity of both the host society and their heritage communities and see facilitating community uplift and developing a more positive social image of ethnic minorities as their generation’s responsibility. Reconstructing an ethnic identity and developing new social images therefore motivate them to pursue academic success. The findings indicate that the South Asian students figured out ways in which to interact with the outer world and set up new roles and spaces (i.e., a heritage community with more positive social image). The findings shed light on how to provide better opportunities for and assistance to ethnic minority students when they pursue higher education. Copyright © 2019 Springer Nature B.V.

Guided by the “opportunity–propensity” (O‐P) framework, this study explores how immigrant status might affect students’ civic knowledge through an antecedent factor (socioeconomic status [SES]), opportunity factors (civic learning at school and civic participation at school), and propensity factors (perceived open classroom climate, perceived student–teacher relationship, and perceived importance of conventional citizenship). The data were taken from the International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS) 2016. The sample comprised 2,544 eighth graders from Hong Kong. Results of two‐level path analysis showed that, at the student level, mainland Chinese immigrant grant students had a higher level of civic knowledge. Although perceived open classroom climate and perceived importance of conventional citizenship were found to be two positive mediators and family SES (via civic learning at school) was a negative mediator, the mediation effects at the student level were quite small. In contrast, quite a large amount of variance was explained at the school level: School‐aggregated immigrant status was positively linked to school‐aggregated civic knowledge and negatively via school‐aggregated students’ family SES via school‐aggregated civic learning. Copyright © 2019 The Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.

This chapter explores different factors that contribute to the school failure of ethnic minority young people in Hong Kong. It draws on a case study approach based on 15 in-depth interviews with 11 “out of school” ethnic minority young people, of whom 6 were dropouts, 4 were at risk of dropping out, and 1 never attended a school. It was also augmented with an additional 22 in-depth interviews with 20 other stakeholders related to ethnic minority education including 3 principals, 6 teachers and support staff, 3 school social workers and NGO professionals, 2 government officials, 3 ethnic minority community leaders, and 3 parents. Several themes were created using schema analysis that help explain different factors making them “out of school.” It has been common to attribute school failure for ethnic minority students in Hong Kong to problems with Chinese language education, yet this study shows that a number of other interrelated factors contributed to their lack of successful schooling. The key influences are multilevel – with individuals themselves, within families, within schools, and within the community. Implications are drawn at the levels of policy, practice, and theory to better support ethnic minority young people’s schooling success in Hong Kong. Copyright © 2019 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

After the “National Education” issue arose in Hong Kong in 2012, the Hong Kong Government “shelved” the Moral and National Education Curriculum Guide. However, the government still claimed that national education would be implemented via different formats. One of the main objectives of national education would be to promote a sense of patriotism regarding (Communist) China, and to teach students about their Chinese “national identities”. However, some of the students in the public schools in Hong Kong are members of ethnic minorities: Pakistanis, Nepalese, Filipinos, etc. The Education Bureau of Hong Kong has designated certain schools which should cater to these students' educational needs, and the students are being taught the official curriculum, the same as the local students. This paper will examine the national education curriculum of these “designated schools”, in order to analyze the ways in which, and the extent to which, this curriculum will promote the establishment of a “national identity” for these ethnic minority students. Copyright © 2018 APNME.